


Bankwupt

by Tametomo



Category: 21st Century CE RPF, Elon musk - Fandom
Genre: Bankwupt, Elon Musk - Freeform, Elon is a menace and must be stopped, Gen, I Don't Even Know, Mark Zuckerberg - Freeform, Short One Shot, Sorry Not Sorry, SpaceX - Freeform, Tesla - Freeform, The Two Musketeers, Thud!, Twitter, a day in the life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-09
Updated: 2018-04-09
Packaged: 2019-04-20 17:45:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14266320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tametomo/pseuds/Tametomo
Summary: It's hard to be a genius. No-one understands Elon's vision. Or his jokes.





	Bankwupt

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this while Mark Zuckerberg was being hauled through the Senate over Facebook privacy, and after one of Elon's more ...uh... memorable episodes on Twitter. If you don't know the background on this, google "Elon Musk April fool". All will become clear.
> 
> I hope Elon Musk never reads this.

“We’ve taken a decision. We’re appointing a social media manager.”

Elon looked blankly at the circle of faces around the table. Was this why they had asked him to come? It wasn't even his day at Tesla. He was meant to be at SpaceX today. He preferred SpaceX. They had rockets. Everyone was nice to him at SpaceX.

“We have a whole team of people doing social media. They have a manager. We just gave her a raise. What are you talking about?”

The board members exchanged glances. This could go one of two ways. Neither was good.

If they were unlucky, there’d be an explosion. Elon had notoriously once thrown a full cup of coffee across a boardroom because it was cold (and also because he hadn’t liked the news that had reached his ears at the precise moment the tepid liquid had reached his lips. The mainstream media always left out that detail.)

If they were really unlucky, there’d be an explosion and someone - or several people - would be fired.

On the other hand, Elon usually fired people for being an obstruction. This time, neither board members nor staff were the cause of the clusterfuck that had prompted this ad-hoc gathering.

There was also the silver lining that at least his temper had never turned physical - at least, not since the days when he and his brother apparently used to make their business decisions by having UFC matches on the office floor. It was just as well. Elon was a big lad. Although back in the day Kimbal was reputedly the more devious one in physical combat, and always won.

JB Straubel, Tesla's Chief Technical Officer, cleared his throat and steadied his voice. The others had decided he should deliver the news. This was probably for the best.

“Not for Tesla. For you.”

He was met with a basilisk stare. The entrepreneur had become infamous for this look. His staff referred to it as “the Terminator”. A chilling silence, and The Look. The eyes, calm and passive even at the worst of times, did not harden or flinch. They merely stilled beneath the slightly hooded lids, zeroing in on their victim with quartz precision. A deceptively soft, almost sleepy look, the only tell being that Elon did not blink. At all. Legend circulated about the time Musk pinned a robotics engineer with the death gaze for a solid, wordless four minutes without blinking. The poor fool had programmed an error into the paint workflow that had left 200 cars marred with missing streaks of paint. The engineer, a 6’3 bearlike man with paws like dinner plates, had wept and exited the room backwards. Rumour was that he now drove tractors on a farm in Idaho. Few people had ever survived the Terminator. JB’s tenure and unique position at the company, as co-founder and unofficial Good Cop to Elon’s Robocop, meant he was among that happy few.

Elon had stood up and now advanced casually around the table towards JB’s seat.

“I don’t need a social media manager. I do my own Twitter and Instagram stuff.”

“That’s the problem, Elon.” JB’s delivery failed him at the last, and Elon’s name wobbled out as if he had stammered it himself.

“There’s no problem, JB. I’m excellent at time management. I can manage my own social media.”

“We wish you wouldn’t,” JB replied quickly, and ducked his head to the side slightly as the CEO loomed over his shoulder.

There was silence. Elon leaned over the table beside JB.

“I like doing it.”

The CTO’s voice dropped to a murmur.

“No-one else li- “

“Finish that sentence, JB.” Elon’s voice was brush-soft. “Go on. Finish it.”

Across the table, Kimbal Musk watched from below his eyebrows. Poor JB. He probably should have stepped up as the emissary for this particular message, but he had known how it would go. Anyway, it was JB’s turn. It was always JB’s turn.

Linda Rice, to his right, dug the lid of her pen studiously into a crevasse in the tabletop.

The air-conditioning unit above them dropped an embarrassing clunk into the soup of the thick, painful atmosphere, and a collective cringe Mexican-waved around the table.

“Our - ah-hrrr - our share price fell through the floor this weekend, Elon.”

Elon dropped to a crouch beside his CTO, balancing his bulk on the balls of his feet, and spreading his elbows across the table in front of him, leaving JB hunched into a bent form around Elon’s left arm.

“I don’t give a shit about our share price,” Elon said evenly.

“The shareholders do. The trade papers and business blogs - “  
Elon interrupted him with a dismissive snort, and pushed himself to his feet. He turned and walked towards the door.

"They've started up the Deathwatch again. The Economist is saying we'll be bankrupt in four months."

"The Economist are douchebags." 

“But this week of all weeks!” JB’s caution deserted him. “I mean… the end of the quarter, the production line is still a shit-show. We really don’t need the column inches - and then Zuckerberg lands on his ass! It’s a fucking gift from God. We were home free. You couldn’t just… keep things on the down low for a few days?”

Elon kept walking.

“You had to fucking show off.”

Elon stopped. JB watched his shoulders rise and sink beneath his furry-collared leather aviator jacket. He wore that jacket everywhere since he had found it in the El Camino Goodwill. It wasn’t even cold. Especially now the air-con had gone into administration.

“I’m doing my own Twitter.”

“Elon - Elon!” Kimbal stood and shoved his chair back with a discordant screech. His brother turned and gazed belligerently at him.

“I mean - fuck. _'Bankwupt'_ \- really? Really, man?”

“It was a joke,” Elon replied testily. “It was funny.”

“It wasn’t funny,’ Linda replied.

“It was funny. I thought it was funny.”

“The shareholders - “

“My followers thought it was funny. 20 million of them.” A few seats away, Steve Jurvetson made a strangled sound.

“Our mom thought it was funny.” His chin was set in a firm line now - not for the first time, Kimbal saw the obstinate six-year-old Elon in his brother’s 46-year-old face.

“Mom thinks everything’s funny!” Kimbal’s voice came out higher than he intended, and dropped his head as several pairs of eyebrows rose around him.

“I didn’t think it was funny,” JB said quietly.

“Well, you don’t have a sense of humour. This is why I didn’t ask you to join the Boring Company,” Elon replied.

“Who did you even find to take the photo?” Kimbal asked, clamping a despairing hand to his forehead.

“I had one of the interns do it. They thought it was funny too.”

Someone in the room let out an indescribable noise.

“It didn’t even make sense!”

“Just because you don’t get my references doesn’t mean it wasn’t funny.”

Kimbal sank back into his seat and put his face in his hands. It seemed as good a place for it as any right now.

“You never get my references. This is why you’re not on the board of Thud!.”

His brother turned again to face him, spreading his hands wide.

“Elon. Oh my God. Stop trying to make Thud! happen. It’s not going to happen.”

“It is. And I’m keeping my Twitter.”

Elon popped the furry collar of his jacket and left the room, maintaining the dignified posture he had been practicing that told all in his path that he had won the argument. He closed the door decisively behind him and strolled down the corridor, scrolling through Twitter on his iPhone. He made a mental note to tell the facilities staff to turn up the air conditioning throughout the complex.

JB looked at Kimbal. Kimbal looked back at him. They both looked at Linda. Steve Jurvetson looked at all of them in turn.

“He’s got to be stopped.”

 


End file.
